The New Albany Lecture Series Upcoming Season Tickets available for 2023-2024 season late summer

[NEW ALBANY, OH, July 26, 2023]– For more than a decade, The New Albany Community Foundation has hosted influential thought leaders as part of The New Albany Lecture Series. The 2023-2024 lineup includes award-winning actress and cancer advocate Laura Linney, syndicated political columnist Jonah Goldberg, New York Times Columnist Ezra Klein, acclaimed ballet dancer and mental health advocate Misty Copeland, retired four-star Army General Wesley Clark and analyst and bestselling author Malcolm Nance, among others. Tickets will go on sale late summer. Details will be posted to social media and at newalbanyfoundation.org. The New Albany Lecture Series has presented more than 60 compelling speakers since the series began ten years ago. It is widely recognized as one of the premier lecture series in the country.

The 11th season of The New Albany Lecture Series will address timely issues such as health, national security and civil discourse. The much-anticipated lectures underscore the importance of the Foundation’s commitment to promote lifelong learning and to provide a platform for community dialogue on critical issues. More than 32,000 students representing over 50 central Ohio high schools have participated in the Foundation’s student lectures, and nearly 48,000 community members have attended the evening lectures.

“We’re so grateful to community members, leading corporations, charitable organizations and many private foundations who continue to support The New Albany Lectures Series through generous sponsorships,” said Craig Mohre, president of the New Albany Community Foundation. “Our sponsors’ support allows us to extend enriching opportunities each year, not only to residents and their families, but to students from more than 50 central Ohio high schools as well,” Mohre added.

The 2023-2024 series kicks off October 3 with this season’s Arts and Health lecture, featuring Laura Linney, a theatre, film and television actress who has won four Emmy Awards and two Golden Globes. Her work includes a role as Wendy Byrde in the Netflix Ozark series. Linney is also respected for her work as a cancer advocate, helping patients and families find ways to laugh and connect through their pain. She will be interviewed by Neda Ulaby, a 20-year NPR veteran who reports on arts, entertainment and cultural trends through stories that reflect political, economic and cultural realities and transitions.

The Civil Discourse and Debate program is set for January 23, with conservative author and columnist Jonah Goldberg and New York Times columnist Ezra Klein, moderated by Leila Fadel, host of NPR’s Morning Edition. Goldberg is a premier political commentator who was senior editor of National Review magazine and is editor-in-chief and co-founder of online conservative magazine The Dispatch. Klein hosts the “Ezra Klein Show” podcast and was the founder and editor-in-chief of Vox, an explanatory news platform. Goldberg and Klein are also bestselling authors. Fadel hosts the NPR morning news podcast Up First as well as Morning Edition and has reported extensively on division in America, touching on issues of policing, race and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mental Health and Social Justice will be explored February 6 as Misty Copeland, Principal Dancer with American Ballet Theater and bestselling author and philanthropist, will be interviewed by Edwaard Liang, artistic director of BalletMet in Columbus for the past 10 years. Copeland became Principal Dancer with American Ballet Theatre in 2015, becoming the first black woman to be so named in the theatre’s then-75-year history. She advocates for Boys & Girls Clubs of America, which aided her in her youth, and recently produced Flower, a short arts film using dance to raise awareness about homelessness. Liang has an international reputation for choreography and has led BalletMet since 2013.

National Security is on tap as the 2023-2024 season wraps up March 12 with General Wesley Clark joined by Malcolm Nance, a bestselling author and former MSNBC terrorism analyst and U.S. government intelligence consultant. General Clark is an author and a West Point graduate as well as a Vietnam veteran who served 38 years in the United States Army and has been awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the State Department’s Distinguished Service Award, among others. He founded Renew America Together, a nonprofit aimed at reducing partisan division. Nance spent 34 years in field and combat work as an Arabic-speaking special intelligence collections operator and field interrogator. He has handled numerous clandestine and counter-terrorism assignments for incidents including the 9/11 attacks, the attack on the USS Cole and the TWA 847 hijacking.

The New Albany Community Foundation recognizes NPR for providing moderators for the New Albany Lecture Series season. The Foundation shares NPR’s goal of providing opportunities for lifelong learning and civil discourse.

Sponsors of the 2023-2024 New Albany Lecture Series include Abercrombie & Fitch Co., American Electric Power Foundation, Anonymous Donors, Battelle, Bechtel, Big Lots Foundation, CAS, The Barbara W. & Philip R. Derrow Family Foundation, Discover Financial Services, Easton Community Foundation, Messer Construction, NAI/Ohio Equities, The Ohio State University and Park National Bank. (List as of 7/26/2023.)

For high-res photos please click HERE.

Laura Linney

 Laura Linney’s respect and gratitude for creative expression is limitless. Born to a prominent NYC playwright and nurse, the Golden Globe, SAG, and Emmy award-winning actress began her experiential education in performance art at an early age.

After graduating from The Juilliard School, Linney went on to appear in leading roles across film, television, and theatre. She’s performed in a myriad of productions such as the films Genius, Nocturnal Animals, Mr. Holmes, Kinsey, You Can Count on Me, Mystic River, Love Actually, and The Truman Show.

Currently, Linney can be seen as Wendy Byrde in the Netflix original series Ozark, a performance which has garnered her both Emmy and SAG Award nominations.

Other notable television credits include the Showtime Series The Big C, the HBO mini-series John Adams, Tales of the City, and Frasier. Prominent Broadway productions include The Crucible, Time Stands Still, Sight Unseen, Six Degrees of Separation, and many more.

Linney has also been honored for her work in cancer advocacy. Having lost family to cancer, she understands the unique physical and emotional damage inflicted on victims and families. She aims to help them find ways to cope, grow, and rebuild so that each one can truly win his or her own fight against cancer.

Laura Linney has been nominated three times for the Academy Award, three times for the Tony Award, once for a BAFTA Award, and five times for the Golden Globe. She has won one SAG Award, one National Board of Review Award, two Golden Globes and four Emmy Awards. She holds two honorary Doctorates from her alma maters, Brown University and The Juilliard School.

Neda Ulaby

Neda Ulaby reports on arts, entertainment, and cultural trends for NPR’s Arts Desk.

Scouring the various and often overlapping worlds of art, music, television, film, new media and literature, Ulaby’s stories reflect political and economic realities, cultural issues, obsessions and transitions.

A twenty-year veteran of NPR, Ulaby started as a temporary production assistant on the cultural desk, opening mail, booking interviews and cutting tape with razor blades. Over the years, she’s also worked as a producer and editor and won a Gracie award from the Alliance for Women in Media Foundation for hosting a podcast of NPR’s best arts stories.

Ulaby also hosted the Emmy-award winning public television series Arab American Stories in 2012 and earned a 2019 Knight-Wallace Fellowship at the University of Michigan. She’s also been chosen for fellowships at the Getty Arts Journalism Program at USC Annenberg and the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism.

Before coming to NPR, Ulaby worked as managing editor of Chicago’s Windy City Times and co-hosted a local radio program, What’s Coming Out at the Movies. A former doctoral student in English literature, Ulaby has contributed to academic journals and taught classes in the humanities at the University of Chicago, Northeastern Illinois University and at high schools serving at-risk students.

Ulaby worked as an intern for the features desk of the Topeka Capital-Journal after graduating from Bryn Mawr College. But her first appearance in print was when she was only four days old. She was pictured on the front page of the New York Times, as a refugee, when she and her parents were evacuated from Amman, Jordan, during the conflict known as Black September.

Jonah Goldberg

One of America’s top political commentators, the co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the former senior editor of National Review magazine, Jonah Goldberg stimulates audiences with bold, provocative critiques of the today’s highly polarized political landscape.

As a speaker, Goldberg helps audiences appreciate the essential nature of politics by examining the underpinnings of liberal and conservative ideologies, economic policy, and the changing role of modern-day media.

A fellow at the National Review Institute and the American Enterprise Institute, Jonah is the author of three New York Times bestsellers: Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left from Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning; The Tyranny of Clichés: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas; and, most recently, Suicide of the West: How the Rebirth of Tribalism, Populism, Nationalism, and Identity Politics is Destroying American Democracy. A nationally syndicated columnist, Jonah is also a weekly columnist for the Los Angeles Times and host of the popular podcast The Remnant with Jonah Goldberg.

A former FOX News and CNN contributor, Goldberg frequently appears as a commentator on network television. Named one of the Top 50 Political Commentators in America by The Atlantic magazine, Jonah is known for nuanced, informed, and thoughtful perspectives that spark indispensable dialogue and debate. Whether discussing the intellectual history of the Left, the hazards posed by political clichés, or the challenges of populism and identity politics, he scrutinizes prevailing opinions and generates new insights.

Ezra Klein

Using his trademark depth of policy knowledge and academic research, Ezra Klein gives audiences a systematic look at why American politics is so polarized, and what that polarization has done to electoral institutions, policymaking, and the media.

Klein is a columnist on the New York Times opinion page, host of the award-winning “Ezra Klein Show” podcast, and author of the bestselling book, “Why We’re Polarized.”

Before that, he was the founder, editor-in-chief, and then editor-at-large of Vox, the explanatory news platform, which has won a bevy of awards and now reaches more than 50 million people each month. He was also a creator and executive producer of its hit Netflix show, “Explained.”

Prior to starting Vox, Klein founded and led The Washington Post’s Wonkblog. He is also a columnist for Bloomberg News and a regular contributor/policy analyst for MSNBC.

The Economist named him one of the “Minds of the Moment.” In 2011, TIME named his blog one of the 25 best financial blogs and the Society of American Business Editors and Writers named Klein as their 2011 Opinion Columnist of the Year. In 2012, GQ named him to their 50 Most Powerful People in Washington list and Esquire named him to their 79 Things We Can All Agree On list saying, “Ezra Klein gives economics columnists a good name.”

Leila Fadel

Leila Fadel is a host of Morning Edition, as well as NPR’s morning news podcast Up First.

As a national correspondent, Fadel consistently reported on the fault lines of this divided nation. She flew to Minneapolis in the midst of the pandemic as the city erupted in grief and anger over the killing of George Floyd. She’s reported on policing and race, on American Muslim communities and on the jarring inequities the coronavirus laid bare in the healthcare system.

Her “Muslims in America: A New Generation” series, in collaboration with National Geographic, won the prestigious Goldziher Prize in 2019.

Previously, she was NPR’s international correspondent based in Cairo and covered the wave of revolts in the Middle East and their aftermaths in Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, and beyond. Her stories brought listeners to the heart of a state-ordered massacre of pro-Muslim Brotherhood protesters in Cairo in 2013 when police shot into crowds of people to clear them and killed between 1,000 and 2,000 people. She told the tales of a coup in Egypt and what it is like for a country to go through a military overthrow of an elected government. She covered the fall of Mosul to ISIS in 2014 and documented the harrowing tales of the Yazidi women who were kidnapped and enslaved by the group. Her coverage also included stories of human smugglers in Egypt and the Syrian families desperate and willing to pay to risk their lives and cross a turbulent ocean for Europe.

She was awarded the Lowell Thomas Award from the Overseas Press Club for her coverage of the 2013 coup in Egypt and the toll it took on the country and Egyptian families. In 2017 she earned a Gracie award for the story of a single mother in Tunisia whose two eldest daughters were brainwashed and joined ISIS. The mother was fighting to make sure it didn’t happen to her younger girls.

Before joining NPR, Fadel covered the Middle East for The Washington Post as the Cairo Bureau Chief. Prior to her position as Cairo Bureau Chief for the Post, she covered the Iraq war for nearly five years with Knight Ridder, McClatchy Newspapers, and later the Washington Post. Her foreign coverage of the devastating human toll of the Iraq war earned her the George. R. Polk award in 2007. In 2016 she was the Council on Foreign Relations Edward R. Murrow fellow.

Fadel is a Lebanese-American journalist who speaks conversational Arabic and was raised in Saudi Arabia and Lebanon.

Misty Copeland

Misty Copeland is a Principal Dancer with American Ballet Theatre, the first Black woman to be promoted to the position in the company’s 75-year history in 2015. She has performed some of the most iconic classical ballet roles, including Odette/Odile in Swan Lake; Juliet in Romeo & Juliet; Giselle; Manon; Coppelia; Kitri in Don Quixote; and Firebird, to name a few.

Misty has been featured in several publications, including the cover of Time Magazine for the Time 100, as well as the covers of ESSENCE, Self, ELLE South Africa, Oxygen and Women’s Health. She has also appeared on CBS’ 60 Minutes, CBS Sunday Morning, ABC’s Good Morning America, NBC’s The Today Show and the talent show Little Big Shots, celebrating extraordinary young people.

She made her first awards season guest performances in 2019 with Taylor Swift at the American Music Awards and at the 2020 Grammy Awards alongside Camilla Cabello, Common, Ben Platt, and dancers from the Debbie

Allen Dance Academy, as well as the televised Prince Grammy Tribute performing with award-winning recording artist H.E.R. Misty made her Broadway debut in On the Town in 2015 and her major motion picture debut in Disney’s The Nutcracker and the Four Realms in 2018.

Misty started her own production company called Life in Motion Productions and recently completed her first project, Flower, a silent arts activism film using dance to raise awareness about homelessness. She is also featured in an episode of MasterClass, the online series.

Misty is an avid philanthropist and is an ambassador of the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, of which she is also an alum. Misty also supports MindLeaps, an arts education program in Rwanda that helps young people get off the streets and into an academic setting to enhance their lives.

Misty Copeland is the author of several New York Times bestsellers, including the memoir, Life in Motion: An Unlikely Ballerina; the lifestyle book, Ballerina Body; and the children’s book, Bunheads. She is also the author of the award-winning children’s book, Firebird. Her latest books are Black Ballerinas: My Journey to Our Legacy, which published in November of 2021 and The Wind at My Back: Resilience, Grace, and Other Gifts from My Mentor, Raven Wilkinson, which published in November of 2022.

Edwaard Liang

A former dancer with New York City Ballet and Nederlands Dans Theater, Edwaard Liang has built an international reputation as a choreographer. Over the last decade, he has created work for the Bolshoi Ballet, Houston Ballet, Joffrey Ballet, Kirov Ballet, New York City Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, Shanghai Ballet, Singapore Dance Theatre and Washington Ballet.

Born in Taipei, Taiwan and raised in Marin County, California, Mr. Liang began his dance training at age five with Marin Ballet. After studying at the School of American Ballet, he joined New York City Ballet in 1993. That same year, he was a medal winner at the Prix de Lausanne International Ballet Competition and won the Mae L. Wien Award. By 1998, he was promoted to Soloist. In 2001, Mr. Liang joined the Tony Award® winning Broadway cast of Fosse. His performance in Fosse was later televised nationally on PBS’ Great Performances series – “Dance in America: From Broadway: Fosse,” and subsequently released on DVD. By 2002, Mr. Liang was invited by Jiri Kylian to become a member of the acclaimed Nederlands Dans Theater 1.

While dancing with NDT 1, Mr. Liang discovered his passion and love for choreography. Since establishing himself as a choreographer, his works have been performed by dance companies around the world and he has won numerous awards for his choreography including the 2006 National Choreographic Competition.

In 2013, Mr. Liang was named Artistic Director at BalletMet where he continues to choreograph new works for companies both domestically and abroad. In 2017, he received an Emmy® Award for his short dance film,

“Vaulted.” In 2018, he created a new ballet with Roberto Bolle for the opening of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland.

General Wesley K. Clark

General Wesley K. Clark, is a businessman, educator, author, commentator, and licensed investment banker who serves as Chairman and CEO of Wesley K. Clark & Associates, a strategic consulting firm.

Clark retired as a four-star general after 38 years in the United States Army, having served in his last assignments as Commander of US Southern Command and then as Commander of US European Command/ Supreme Allied Commander, Europe. He worked with Ambassador Richard Holbrooke in the Dayton Peace Process, where he helped write and negotiate significant portions of the 1995 Dayton Peace Agreement. In his final assignment as Supreme Allied Commander Europe he led NATO forces to victory in Operation Allied Force, a 78-day air campaign, backed by ground invasion planning and a diplomatic process, saving 1.5 million Albanians from ethnic cleansing. A candidate for the presidency in 2003, General Clark is a Vietnam veteran, a West Point graduate and a former Rhodes Scholar.

Among his many awards and honors are the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the State Department’s Distinguished Service Award, five Defense Distinguished Service Medals, the Silver Star and the Purple Heart.

In 2019, Clark founded Renew America Together, a nonprofit organization designed to promote and achieve greater common ground in America by reducing partisan division and gridlock. A best-selling author, General Clark has written four books and is a frequent contributor on TV, newspapers and radio, he speaks on diplomacy, leadership and technology before business and public audiences.

Malcolm Nance

Malcolm Nance is a counter- terrorism and intelligence consultant for the U.S. government’s Special Operations, Homeland Security and Intelligence agencies. He’s also a counter-terrorism analyst for NBC News/MSNBC and the author of the NYT’s Bestseller: The Plot To Destroy Democracy, which is a sequel to: The Plot to Hack America, His most recent book, They Want to Kill Americans, was on the NYTs Bestsellers list in 2022. This book outlines the threat America faces from US led militia groups.

Over 34 years, Nance participated in field and combat intelligence activity including experience as an Arabic-speaking special intelligence collections operator, field interrogator as well as providing both covert and clandestine anti

& counter-terrorism support to national intelligence agencies and assets. A former Navy intelligence operator, he deployed on numerous clandestine anti-terrorism and counter-terrorism intelligence, special reconnaissance operations in the Balkans, Middle East and sub-Saharan Africa indirect support or seconded to the principle agencies of the Special Operations and Intelligence Community on land, ship and submarine. He has eye witnessed numerous terrorist incidents and/or participated in response operations from the American Embassy and US Marine Barracks bombing in Beirut, Lebanon; the TWA 847 hijacking; the Achille Lauro Marjacking, the Libyan Air Raid, combat operations against the Iranian Navy, the first Gulf War, the War in the Balkans, the millennium bomb plot, the attack on the USS Cole, the September 11th attacks, the Libyan revolution and served as an intelligence contractor and advisor in both Iraq and Afghanistan. He served his last four years in the US Navy as a master training specialist and instructor at the US Navy Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE) School in Coronado, California. He led resistance to interrogation teams including leading and supervising over 700 waterboardings. He conceptualized and implemented the Advanced Terrorism, Abduction and Hostage Survival school (ATAHS) in resisting torture, exploitation and escaping terrorist captivity from 1997-2001. At ATAHS he created and led the terrorism training team formed to simulate the Al Qaeda organization and its attacks for Tier-1 National Mission Units and select members of the US Intelligence community in the pre-9/11 era.

He assisted in the investigation of the World Trade Center attacks. Post 9/11 he provided support to the special operations and Intelligence community in analysis of Al Qaeda and global Jihadi tactics, techniques and procedures. He has trained and advised numerous international and government agency personnel in terrorist tactics and countering extremist ideology including the US Department of Defense and US Department of Homeland Security.

Abroad he has served as an intelligence contractor in Afghanistan, Libya, and in Iraq as a security director for the Iraq Economic Redevelopment Program at the Republican palace under the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad as well as the acting security director for the United Nations inter-NGO security committee for Iraq. For ten years he was the president and chief expatriate advisor of the UAE-based Fearless Security Group including Fearless Arabia, Fearless Iraq and Fearless North African Resources a private security contractor consortium that trains and leads local security forces in Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Gulf States.

Malcolm is author of several books on global terrorism including:

The Terrorist Recognition Handbook: A Practitioner’s Manual on Predicting and Identifying Terrorist Activity.

The Terrorists of Iraq: Inside the Strategy and Tactics of the Iraq Insurgency 2003-2014

An End to al-Qaeda: Destroying Bin Laden’s Jihad, Restoring America’s Honor.

Defeating ISIS: Who They Are, How They Fight and What They Believe

A recognized expert on the dynamic of terrorism in geopolitics he has taught at the Defense Intelligence Agency, Macquarie University (Australia), Victoria University (NZ). He is a member of the Board of Advisors at the International Spy Museum in Washington DC.

Nance is a graduate of New York Excelsior University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Arabic.

###

The New Albany Lecture Series is just one of the major initiatives undertaken by The New Albany Community Foundation, which was created in 1995 to advance the aspirations of the community in perpetuity. The Foundation invests in programs and initiatives that enrich the community in the areas of lifelong learning, health and wellness, arts and culture, and a sustainable environment. Since its inception, the Foundation has awarded more than $22 million in grants to area nonprofit organizations that enrich lives.